Kingdom Tales 2 is an excellent builder/time management game that will not only entertain, it will also challenge you exactly as much as you want it to.

Kingdom Tales 2 is G5's latest entry in the builder/time management genre. Spread across 40 levels, your task is to reunite Finn with Princess Dahla by proving his worth to her father, The King. In-game fiction aside, your actual job is to build and/or repair structures, gather resources, and produce/trade materials. This is accomplished by way of a lofty overhead view that gives you full and easy access to whatever you need. By the way, games like this absolutely shine on mobile devices due to their touch screens that allow you to make quick selections without having to scroll a mouse across the screen to do so. If you're really in a hurry, set your iPad on your lap and play with multiple fingers. It all works quite well, and is completely intuitive.

All needed tasks are performed by workers that spew endlessly from your central building upon your command. Want to build a dwelling or a workshop? Simply tap on the appropriate menu item at the bottom, select what you want to build, and then tap where you want it to go. You will need gold to buy needed resources, dwellings to produce gold, and resources to build the dwellings. One minor departure from similar games is the way resources are produced. Instead of, say, sawmills continually producing wood, you use your accumulated gold to buy the resources, with larger purchases providing a better value than smaller ones. This adds a new layer of strategy to the game as you try to quickly figure out how much wood you should buy. Holding out for the larger purchase will give you more total wood, but you may run out of it at a crucial time as you try to save the needed gold. Success will require efficiency (no resources sitting idle), speed, and strategy (knowing what to build and when). The highest difficulty will give you no margin for error, which inevitably requires replaying levels multiple times until perfection is achieved. While this is fairly standard for the genre, what is unusual, however, is the ability to play the game in relaxed mode, which disables the in-game timer. This is a fantastic idea as it allows you to experiment with new strategies or just learn how to play without any frustration whatsoever. It also opens the game up to an entirely new group of gamers who may not enjoy frantic tapfests, such as young children (yes, the game is completely kid-friendly in other ways, too). Lastly, Kingdom Tales 2 offers ten Game Center Achievements for you to unlock.

Graphics

Kingdom Tales 2 supports HD visuals on retina-enabled devices, and is a beautiful game thanks to the smoothly animated characters and meticulously drawn maps.

Sound

The in-game music is light and whimsical, matching the mood of the game perfectly. The sound effects, which consist primarily of building sounds, are also very well done, and add to the immersion factor without getting annoying.

Conclusion

Kingdom Tales 2 is a great iteration of the builder/time management game, and one that should please not only fans of the genre, but also newcomers looking for a more relaxed experience. There is plenty of content here for the cost of admission (pay once for full unlock; no other in-app purchases offered or required), which means you won't have to keep paying if you want to keep playing.

Ratings (scale of 1 to 5):

Graphics: - 4.5 - The hand-drawn sprites are colorful and well-animated.Sound: - 4.5 - Very good music and sound effects.Controls: - 5 - An organized interface, and accurate touch controls make all the difference in the world in games like this.Gameplay: - 4.5 - An enjoyable time management game that doesn't attempt to fix what isn't broken.

Playing Hints and Tips:

Those new to the genre should play the first few levels in Relaxed Mode until you get the feel for where everything is and how it all works. You'll know when to engage the timer; trust me. You can't do anything without gold so build your dwellings first. The criteria for success in each mission is clearly listed on the right side of the screen. Pay attention to it and you won't get lost wondering what to do next.